


Even by yourself, you are something else

by ithinkiloveyoubetternow



Series: Nursey week [1]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Anxiety, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, M/M, Nursey Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-08
Updated: 2017-02-08
Packaged: 2018-09-22 21:46:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9626894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ithinkiloveyoubetternow/pseuds/ithinkiloveyoubetternow
Summary: ‘Nursey?’ Dex was talking, his face hovering above him. He had the sudden thought that it looked a little like the moon at night. ‘Why are you out here all alone, man? You’d freeze to death if we’d let you.’Nursey was still desperately trying to dispel the heavy feeling in his chest as Dex rambled on. He felt warmth spreading through his left side when Dex plopped himself down on the ground next to him. ‘Bad day?’ He nodded.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Nursey shows signs of a panic attack in this fic. It's all very vague, but be warned if that's something you'd rather not read.

Nursey was sitting against his favorite tree on the Lake Squad. The landscape felt perfect for his mood. The wind was whipping harshly around his ears, the ground was a mess of leaves splattered everywhere. The cold was just biting enough that no one else would try to hang out with him here. 

He loved to journal his feelings, sometimes he felt that his writing was the only rightful place for the jumbled mess that were his thoughts. His messy mind belonged in a book, it was no one else’s business. Why would he bother anyone with his thoughts when he was perfectly okay just keeping it all in? Bottling everything up was his tried and tested method. It might not have been perfect, but it was what he knew. 

Nursey knew it wasn’t very healthy to think like this. He’d been through several therapists already, and they had all tried and failed to make him open up. Years at Andover had taught him that his thoughts made him vulnerable. He couldn’t afford to show any weakness. His best friend growing up, Rami, once told him that being who he was, was already trying enough. He warned him that vulnerability was a weakness that would be taken advantage of. Rami had meant well, he just wanted to protect Derek. But it had stuck with him and over the years, he’d put up walls for everyone around him.

His mom had been happy to hear that he knew someone at Samwell, when he told her that he decided on the SMH team. She worried for him, which he hated. He didn’t want his love for her to be tainted by worry. He resented her for it. If having Shitty on the team would ease her mind a little however, he’d gladly tell her how comfortable he felt with a familiar face on the team and how well he felt like he already fit in. 

The truth was that he knew Shitty as a teammate, but they’d never really bonded beyond that at Andover. He’d kept his walls up for everyone.

When he first arrived at Samwell he had high hopes for himself. Filled with promises to try harder to fit in, to let himself be happy. But as soon as the other frogs had started bonding, he had closed himself off again. He felt stupid for getting his hopes up like that. He couldn’t function as they did. He’d never be normal like them. Despite the team’s best bonding efforts, he still had only given them the pieces of himself that he had deemed appropriate after careful inspection.

As Nursey thought about everything that had spurred him on to come out here today, his thoughts ran rampant. The shitty weather had only gotten worse. It had started to drizzle softly and the words in his notebook had started to bleed a little. The sudden urge to cry rose from his chest and lodged in his throat. Why had he let his thoughts spiral like that? He was breathing a little heavily when he was abruptly shaken out of his thoughts. 

"Nurse? Are you alright?" He tried to swallow. Cleared his throat. Tried again. "Nursey?" Dex was talking, his face hovering over him. He had the sudden thought that it looked a little like the moon at night. "Why are you out here all alone? You’d freeze to death if we’d let you, man." 

Nursey was still desperately trying to dispel the heavy feeling in his chest as Dex rambled on. He felt warmth spreading through his left side when Dex plopped himself down on the ground next to him. "Bad day?" He nodded. His eyes were squeezed shut. He didn’t remember shutting them.

"I’m just going to put this on you, so you won’t actually get pneumonia. Don’t worry, I won’t touch you." Dex’s voice had gone much quieter now. Nursey felt his warm breath on his face as he carefully put a blanket around his shoulders. "There you go, bro." 

They sat like that for what felt like hours. The drizzle had turned into a heavier rainfall, but Dex had brought his big rainbow umbrella. That boy thought of everything. Nursey remembered that one time on a roadie, he’d even brought spare underwear for Chowder. He chuckled.

"Coming back to us there Nursey?" "Y-" His voice croaked. "Uh Hmm. Yes." He turned his head, Dex was already looking at him intently. "What time is it?" Without glancing at his watch, Dex said "Don’t worry, we haven’t been sitting here that long." Nursey felt embarrassed suddenly and his eyes widened "I’m sorry Dex, you can leave now. I’m sure there’s more important things that need your attention. We all know you and Jack Zimmerman work harder than God." He tried to tack on a joke at the end, but it fell flat. Dex noticed. 

"Nurse. Derek. Look at me. You’re important to me, okay? You’re important to us." "I... - Yeah, okay." "When we noticed you hadn’t come to team lunch, we all got worried. Rans said he found you were upset last week after a phone call with your mom? Everything alright?" Another heavy pause fell between the two of them, but Dex didn’t get up. He wasn’t fed up with Nursey’s silence yet. "I.. uh I’d rather not talk about it. It’s chill." He felt Dex squeeze his arm. They were still looking at each other, Dex hadn’t let him look away yet. "That’s okay, you don’t have to talk. But I’m here if it’s suddenly not so chill anymore too." 

He squinted. That was definitely a chirp. "I can’t believe you’re chirping me right now. You’re the worst Poindexter." Dex released him and slung an arm around his shoulders. "Yeah well, I can’t be expected to be this good looking and be good at comforting people. That just wouldn’t be fair." "Ooh, I have some bad news then Dexy, your ugly mug doesn’t make up for your weak chirps. Or your truly abysmal karaoke skills." Dex poked him in the stomach. "Okay, I see we’re playing it dirty! Maybe I should tell the team about the time I helped you clean up the cake you baked in the microwave then?" He wrestled Dex to the ground and held his head in a lock. "You promised we would never mention that again!" "Yeah well the karaoke thing was a low blow!" He released him. "Let’s just agree that we’re both irresistible catches and anyone would be lucky to have us?" Dex grinned and bumped his fist. "Samwell’s prettiest d-man team." "Don’t let Rans and Holtzy hear you." "Yeah, You’re right. I’m pretty sure they would take more offense to the pretty thing than if we said we were better players." "Tcheah." Nursey stood up and offered his hand to pull Dex up. "C’mon man, I’m hungry, let’s see if Bitty has something in the oven." 

As they walked back to the Haus, Nursey realized that the team did know him. He might not tell them everything, but they filled up the spaces that he left empty with love anyway. They had his back. And they were loud enough to fill up his silences every once in a while.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for day 1 of Nursey week (prompt: silence).  
> This is my first work for the omgcp fandom, and my first one in a very long time. Be gentle with me, but feel free to leave tips if you have any!  
> All characters belong to Ngozi. Title is from Walk the Moon's 'Portugal'.
> 
> This was originally supposed to be a NurseyRans fic, where Nursey takes Rans to Annie's to thank him for taking care of him. I could still technically write that as a continuation of this fic. Would anyone be interested in that?


End file.
